Oxford encounter

Crossing paths with
Memorial’s Rhodes Scholars

By Kelly Foss

Chance encounters are the stuff of Hollywood legend. A group of
people coincidentally converging at the same place at the same time
only happens in the movies. The stars could never possibly align in
such a way in the real world, right?

But what began as an attempt by Dr. Paris Georghiou, a professor
of chemistry at Memorial, to catch up with a former student who is
currently a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, led to just such
an encounter in October. While none of the group was a mathematics
major, the calculation of the odds of such a meeting must certainly
have been astronomical.

“I had always promised, or threatened, Luke Pike who was
our 2007 Rhodes Scholar that I would visit him at Oxford,”
said Dr. Georghiou. “In October I stopped in London en route
from a stint at Norwich where I had been doing some research. I had
previously spoken to a friend from Newfoundland who was going to be
in Oxford visiting her mother at the same time, and we had planned
to get together for tea.

“So that Saturday, I phoned Luke on his cell phone to make
arrangements to get together that Sunday. I told him I wanted to
invite a friend to join us and asked if he knew Francesca Swann,
the host of the popular St. John’s CBC radio program,
Musicraft.”

Although Mr. Pike didn’t know Ms. Swann, he repeated her
name aloud thoughtfully, says Dr. Georghiou. Amazingly, who should
be walking by him at that very moment …?

“I was walking along St. Giles en route from my Oxford
High School reunion to Sainsbury’s supermarket to buy
tomatoes,” says Ms. Swann. “As I walked past St.
John’s College, a young man was leaning against an old
lamppost talking on his cell phone. Just as I approached him, he
said my name to the other person on the other end of the call. I
stopped and said ‘That’s my name!’ There was a
stunned silence and we looked quizzically at each other for a
moment, then he asked me if I knew someone called Paris
Georghiou.”

As if that weren’t coincidence enough, Mr. Pike, who had
stopped by Oxford University to prepare for a social event for his
power-lifting club, wasn’t the only person standing by the
lamppost. Just prior to the cell phone call, he had bumped into an
old friend, Paul Boland, who just happened to be Memorial
University’s 2006 Rhodes Scholar and another former student
of Dr. Georghiou.

“I was going to check my “pigeonhole” (mail)
at St. John’s College,” said Mr. Boland. “I was
chatting to Luke and unlocking my bike from a lamp post when
Francesca overheard Paul talking to Paris. Somehow we all ended up
there in front of St. John’s at the exact same
moment.”

Dr. Georghiou is just as awed by the young Rhodes Scholars as he
is by the serendipitous events that brought them all together that
day in October.

“These young men are wonderful ambassadors of ours,”
said Dr. Georghiou. “They’re working on some front line
stuff. It’s my hope and understanding that both will
eventually return to Newfoundland.”

Mr. Pike, who is originally from Grand Bank, is currently
studying the molecular mechanisms of cell death in breast cancer,
and how these pathways may be altered to allow cancer cells to
survive the harsh micro-environmental stressors within the solid
tumour mass.

Mr. Boland, a native of Corner Brook, is also interested in
cancer research. He has completed an M.Sc. in diagnostic imaging
and is now a D.Phil. student with the Nuffield Department of
Surgery. His current work looks at using information derived from
computer aided image processing of MRI and CT scans to address the
currently underutilized role of diagnostic imaging in the surgical
management and staging of head and neck cancers. He has completed
two years of medical school at Memorial and after he finishes at
Oxford he will return to Newfoundland to begin his third year.